Friday, March 25, 2016

Multiple Reliable Eyewitnesses (part 5 in the Why I Believe series)

In part
3 and part
4 of this series, I wrote about how evidence in creation shows that there
must be a great, wise, powerful Creator.I explained that knowing that we serve a God who created everything
should give us courage to obey and follow Jesus.

But the evidence we see through creation can only take us
so far.Creation tells us that there
must be a highly intelligent Designer, but how do we know who that Designer/Creator
is?I don’t believe in a vague concept
of God.I specifically believe, worship,
and serve the God of the Bible.And I
believe that God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to be Lord and Savior. I believe
Jesus died and that he rose again.And
with God’s help I have been willing to face danger and suffer loss for these
beliefs.So, it’s not enough to explain
why I believe in God, I must go on to explain specifically why I believe in
Jesus.

For me, one of the strongest types of evidence which gives
me certainty about Jesus is the nature of the testimony about Jesus we find in
New Testament.If Jesus really did rise
from the dead after being crucified, it would be foolish not to believe all
that the Bible says about Him.In the
Bible, we find multiple, reliable, eyewitness testimony to the resurrection of
Jesus.

The Bible is not the only book which claims to teach us who
the great Creator of the universe is.There are several competing “holy books”.Because these books contradict each other in
significant ways, they cannot all be true.After the Bible, the next most widely read “holy book” is the
Quran.The Bible teaches that Jesus died
for our sins, rose from the dead, and is mankind’s only Savior and Lord.The Quran specifically denies these
claims.Comparing the nature of the
testimony in the Bible and the Quran is a good way to see why I am so convinced
that Jesus really is Lord and Savior, and that it really does make sense to
follow Him, no matter the cost.While the
Quran is the second most influential “holy book” in the world, in the US there
are more Mormons than Muslims.So, I’ve
also included the Book of Mormon in my comparison.

New Testament/ Apostles

Quran/ Muhammad

Book of Mormon/ Joseph
Smith

Multiple Witnesses?

Yes

No

No

Moral & Reliable Witnesses?

Yes

No

No

Includes Eyewitness Testimony?

Yes

No

No

Testimony brought worldly gain or suffering?

Suffering

Worldly Gain

Worldly

Gain

Eyewitnesses

Muhammad writes about events in the life of Jesus even
though Muhammad was not there.Joseph
Smith writes about Jesus going to visit ancient American Indian tribes whom
Joseph Smith never saw (by the way, no one else ever saw them either!).But the New Testament includes among its
authors men who saw with their own eyes the death and resurrection of Jesus
Christ (Acts 4:20, 1 John 1:1).

Multiple Witnesses

The Book of Mormon was written by one man – Joseph Smith.The Quran was written by one man – Muhammad.The New Testament was written by either 8 or
9 men (depending on whether or not Paul wrote Hebrews).Of the New Testament authors, at least three
(Matthew, John, and Peter) were present for multiple appearances of Jesus after
he rose from the dead.Luke based his
gospel on a careful investigation of other eyewitnesses (Luke 1:1-2).Mark may have been an eyewitness himself and
may have based some of his gospel on information from Peter.

These New Testament witnesses all agree on the following
facts:

Jesus was killed on a cross.This happened in front of many people and
there was overwhelming evidence that he was really dead.

Jesus was placed in a grave.

Jesus rose from the dead and appeared many times to his
disciples.He talked with them and ate
with them.

Reliable Witnesses

Neither Muhammad nor Joseph Smith were men any father
would want their daughter to live near.They both claimed to receive revelations from God telling them they
could marry as many women as they wanted, and in both cases this included women
who had been married to another man.

The Apostles taught a very high standard of
morality.They are not portrayed as
being perfectly sinless, but there is no record of them ever doing anything
which would cast doubt on their character and integrity.They were the type of men you would be glad
to have as a neighbor.

There is more to being a reliable witness.When weighing the testimony of a witness it is
helpful to consider if the witness has any motivation to lie. In other words, if a witness is gaining
something by their testimony, it is less reliable.On the other hand, if a witness faces loss
and suffering for their testimony, it is much more likely that they are telling
the truth.

While Muhammad and Joseph Smith did both face opposition
and controversy, as a result of their “prophecies” they became leaders with a
lot of worldly power.As mentioned, they
also both gained many wives.The Bible
rightly warns against false religious leaders who are greedy (2 Peter 2:3) and
who want to marry other men’s wives (2 Peter 2:14).

What about the Apostles?Did they gain anything in this world from their testimony?Far from it!They were beaten, imprisoned, and most of them eventually killed because
of the testimony about Jesus.But they
never stopped testifying and they never changed their story.

An Analogy

The claim that someone rose from the dead is a fantastic
claim. I offer an analogy as to why I believe it.

To the east of our little town are a series of fields and
farm roads where I like to walk with our dog, Sadie.There are some places where we cannot go
because there are marshes with lots of water, mud, and bogs.

Now, what if someone told me that out in the middle of a
certain marshy area there was an angel next to a tree stump and on the tree
stump was a pile of huge diamonds, each worth 100 million dollars.The angel would allow each resident of our
town who came to him to take one diamond.Would I head out into the muddy marsh?Of course, not.The story is unbelievable.

But, what if the person who told me was a reliable person
like my neighbors George, Sam, Dennis, and Calvin?Because the claim was so incredible, I probably
still would doubt it was true.

What if three of four of them all told me that they had
been out there and seen it themselves?I
would probably think it was some kind of practical joke.I still wouldn’t believe it.

But what if a group of ruffians came and threatened my
neighbors who were telling this story.When my neighbors kept telling the story, the ruffians beat up three of
them and killed one of them.When I
visited the other three in the hospital, one who was a brother of the man
killed, they all continued to insist that they had seen it themselves and that
it was true.

I would be putting on a pair of duck waders and heading
out into the marsh!

Eternal life is worth a lot more than 100 million
dollars.There are multiple, reliable,
eyewitnesses who kept testifying to the resurrection of Jesus even after they
were jailed, beaten, and some of them killed.I’m a believer.I’m following
Jesus!

Final Note

Like all analogies and illustrations, the above analogy
is far from perfect.An angel guarding
diamonds would be kind of silly.A Savior
dying for our sins is very serious.Also, the multiple, reliable, eyewitnesses to the resurrection found in
the New Testament are far from the only evidence that Christianity is
true.That’s why this is part 5 out of a
whole series on “Why I Believe”.And my
series will contain only a tiny fraction of the evidence found in many books on
this topic, and all the books in the world could not really contain all the
evidence God has given (John 21:25).

This is part 5, you may find links to other blog posts in this "Why I Believe . . ." series below:

Blog Posts in
the “Why I Believe Enough to Keep Following Jesus” Series